


A Logical Choice

by LeTempest



Category: James Bond (Craig movies), James Bond (Movies), Skyfall (2012) - Fandom
Genre: Established Relationship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-06
Updated: 2013-01-06
Packaged: 2017-11-23 20:23:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/626171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LeTempest/pseuds/LeTempest
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Q is nothing if not a sensible man. He weighs his options before he makes his decisions. His relationship with Bond is no different.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Logical Choice

**Author's Note:**

> My first tiptoeing into the 00Q fandom, so please be gentle with me! I have been a Bond fan since I was young but most of my knowledge of the universe comes from the Daniel Craig films, so I was kind of flying by the seat of my pants! Hope you enjoy and let me know what you think!
> 
> Disclaimer: Don't own Bond and I make no profit from this fic.

            The water was scalding hot on his skin, the way he liked it. Q stepped under the spray of water, in what was probably the nicest shower he’d ever had the opportunity to lay eyes. A Quartermaster’s salary was nothing to scoff at but he had always been a creature of simple comforts and he saw little sense in wasting money on frivolous things he didn’t have the time to enjoy. He preferred a small and unassuming flat, filled to the brim with his true loves; art, books, and computers.

            Bond, it seemed, was a different kettle of fish all together. Everything about him was polished and expensive, posh to a tee. Even his bathroom. All dark granite and frosted glass and stainless steel. Sleek, mod, just like the owner. He was definitely not Q’s usual type. It remained to be seen whether that was for good or ill.

            Q was a man of sense and reason. One had to be, with a genius level IQ and penchant for extreme boredom. Both traits in conjunction could get one into a lot of trouble, if you didn’t keep your head in the right place. Q would know. He’d landed himself on a number of government watch lists before he was even out of his teens, due to his antics.  But with age had come the ability to think logically, how to step back and categorize the aspects of his life, to examine each decision by what could be gained against what could be lost. They didn’t always sort into neat little packages, but it made the day to day more manageable than it had once been.

            He sighed, running his hands through his damp hair, turning his face into the hot spray of the water. He ached, but it was good ache, the stiff muscles grained from a fantastic shag. And James Bond was nothing if not a fantastic shag.

            That was definitely on the top of the pros list when it came to Bond. He’d honestly been surprised when the double O agent had asked him to dinner that first time; he’d been even more taken aback when the older man had asked him back to his flat. But the sex had been the biggest shocker; rough, hard, bent-over-the-table kind of fucking that left them both a shaking mess. Never had a man left him so wrecked. Never had a man kept him coming back for more that way James Bond did.  

Q wasn’t the kind who was used to being taken off guard. Still, it was nice, being wanted by a man like Bond. He was posh and suave, so far from the quiet, bookish types Q usually found himself attracted to. Q usually dated(or fucked, depending on his needs and what the situation allowed) men like himself. He was private by nature, a trait that was necessary in his line of work. He liked private men, quiet men. The kind that enjoyed downplayed pubs, half hidden cafes, or museums. Intellectual men. Men you could shag and never talk to again. Men like Bond, handsome, dashing men, they usually asked too many questions. They liked to show off their toys. They could only be fed the state mandated lies for so long before they started asking questions Q didn’t have answers to.

            That was another pro. Dating someone in the agency gave Q a sense of relief. He didn’t have to fed Bond any lies, didn’t have to make up any excuses for the 2 am calls, the sudden need to cancel plans, the long, odd hours, or the sudden fits of shell shock that accompanied the loss of an agent on his watch. He didn’t have to endure the questions or concerned looks concerning the old scars that spider webbed his arms and thighs. He didn’t have to defend his smoking habit, his drinking, his lack of sleep, craving for rough sex, the raging need to be bruised and pleasantly aching when he left in the morning. He doesn’t have to feel bad about the thrill he got when a mark went down, when one of those bastards got exactly what they deserve. These were things that Bond understood, and if he didn’t, he didn’t question them. He accepted them as fact and moved on. 

            But there were far more cons to Bond. He was _the_ 007, M’s favored son. He was infamous for his escapades, and while Q knew it shouldn’t bother him, it did. He had always been fond of the concept of monogamy, if for no other reason than it brought stability to his rather unstable being. Knowing who’s bed he would be in, knowing he had someone to fill his needs, he liked that.  He had no problem with the one night stand either because he was an adult and he had adult needs. Once, and then all ties were cut. He never had to see the person again. Neither of those options were something he could have with Bond, not now, not ever. That simple wasn’t the nature of the job. Bond’s looks, his sexuality were as much a weapon as anything Q could give him. And even if they had been a one and done thing, he was Bond’s quartermaster. Bond relied on Q to keep him alive, there was no avoidance in that scenario.

            And there presented another problem. Q had heard a number of agents die; some quickly, some not.  He’d watched as the white lights of lives, of human beings, were wiped off his computer screen because of a bomb or other explosion. And ever time, it broke him. It left him shut down, locked off, forced him into the dark comers of his study where it was safe to rage and drink and scream until the pain stopped, until he could pick up the pieces of himself, could accept the death that had happened on his watch, and solider on. Queen and Country. But if things continued like this, the dinners, the sex, the midnight conversations, the morning tea, there was a very real and present danger that Q could become attached to this man. He wasn’t sure he could handle that, listening to the man he was shagging choke to death on his own blood or be burned alive or some other unimaginably terrible way to go, all the while listening to Q tell him everything was going to be fine, the comforting lies he always told his dying men. Q had a method to keeping himself functioning, as carefully crafted as any computer code. Throw in an unknown factor and there was a real chance the whole system could crash.

            There was also the man’s complete lack of artistic appreciation. Honestly, a “bloody big ship”? For a man so sophisticated, his taste was horrendous.

            He was just beginning to scrub his skin, when he heard the bathroom door open. He couldn’t help but smile. He’d left the older man in bed, sleepy and grinning, all crystal blue eyes and fine lines. More handsome than any man his age has a right to be. The double O did everything in his own time, by his reckoning, and apparently he’d seen fit to join Q this morning.

            He rapped his knuckles on the glass of the shower door.

            “Quinn,” he asked, his voice still rough with sleep.

            Another pro. Here, just for a moment, Q could be Quinn Harker again. It wasn’t a roll he was fully comfortable with just yet, not a person he really knew. But he was getting there. It made it easier, being Q when the occasion called for it and being Quinn when the situation allowed. Quinn, who’d first kissed a boy when he was 12 and had two teeth knocked out in the aftermath. Quinn, who had seen the distant sadness in his parent’s eyes when they realized they would never really understand him. Quinn who had graduated high school at 15 and ended up on a government watch list the same year. Quinn whose fiancée left him two years ago because he couldn’t deal with the lies anymore. Those things were Quinn’s, not Q’s.

It helped them both in a way, allowed them to separate this from work. It allowed him to keep some things to himself. Another thing he liked about James Bond, the man understood the need for space, and he always afforded Quinn the space he needed, always asked before he breached that threshold, like he was asking now. He understood that sometimes you just needed distance, because reality is cruel and unforgiving and never entirely escapable.

            “Well, come on then,” he called back, and he heard James chuckle, followed by the ruffling of clothes.

            The shower door opened with a click, and a warm, solid body pressed against his back. Wide hand splayed out on his narrow hips, matching the calloused fingers to the bruises there. A sharp kiss on the curve of his shoulder, and Q let his eyes flutter, catching his lower lip between his teeth, caught up in a heat that the shower was not responsible for. No, James Bond was not a safe choice, there were definite disadvantages to their arrangement. Q wasn’t even sure he could define the agent as a decent man. But then again, Q knew that was a category he couldn’t be placed in either. Perhaps it was that fact, more than any other, that made this the logical choice. 


End file.
